In many places where public gather for the acquisition and exposure of products and services, such as fairs, conventions, information centers and so on, there is a need to use furniture and counters approach the public to the suppliers and present their products to them. In this regard, there is an important variety of such furniture, e.g. wooden-made, metallic, furnished with shelves, partitions; in general terms, though, they are bulky, difficult to handle and transport thereof results in hardships since they take up a lot of space.
One art-known solution to such problems has involved the creation of carton folding furniture and counters. Nevertheless, their structural rigidity is poor and, furthermore, it is impossible for one person to lean thereon. In addition, this type of carton-made furniture lacks of an outstanding aesthetical appearance, which is an important factor to achieve a commercial impact of the product or service being supplied.
There also exists furniture with countless panels, rods and posts that cooperate to each other; however, assembly thereof is time-consuming and the pieces to be assembled are too many.
Despite the above, there are counters that have been broadly accepted and which are practical to use for such purposes, among them those counters that contain a base and a cover mounted on the base and a board assembled on at least one post that is inserted in the cover. In this type of counters, the board helps to identify the name of the supplier or the product being offered while the supplier is located behind the counter to attend to the customers approaching the module.
One of such counters is disclosed in Mexican patent No. 212,227, whose most significant advantage is that the counter elements can be disassembled and stored in the form of a briefcase, in which the cover forms a shield of said briefcase and the base is housed within; at the same time the other pieces of the counter are also housed therein.
The counter of the above-mentioned patent was restructured in Mexican patent No. 225,710, wherein the most significant changes are the inclusion of 45° cuttings between the post sections that support the board and a second shelf that runs on a rail, in addition a support to secure the post sections within the second shelf was included. In spite of such modification, the board is still unstable since it sways over the cover. Furthermore, the shelves frequently fall off their horizontal position because at their free side ends the shelves are secured only by pressure between the side panels of the base.
In international patent application No. PCT/1B2005/002083, there are provided a series of modifications to the counter of Mexican patent No. 225,710, and such modifications relate to the inclusion of media to support shelves firmly so that they do not move, either that the counter is in a upright position or folded.
In this type of counters, the cover is an independent piece that must be manipulated to mount it on the base, and serves as a house for the folded base, which may become complicated for some people, apart from the fact that it takes time to do these operations.
As it may be observed, the base of the counters of the previous art has a substantial role, since it is the part that supports all the weight, and products to offer are placed on it. Another function of the base is that it functions as a housing for storing the other pieces of the counter, and furthermore, it is preferably foldable so that it takes little space when the counter is disassembled.
In addition, bases for the counters of the prior art are fully open on the back, being desirable to have a closed base to keep the products shown in these counters. However, it should not lose the characteristics of being a foldable, light-weight base.